Two Stories

by Lynn Pattison

Obituary

Lynn Pattison, nee Phillips, died restlessly and with protests last Saturday, October 13th. She was by no stretch of the imagination prepared to meet: the grim reaper, her maker, or the devil. I have not packed a bag! she is reputed to have cried. Her husband of 30 years—most of them loving—confirmed that Pattison was “smudged out by the big eraser in the sky,” as she liked to put it, at about 7 o’clock a.m. on Saturday. “She never liked to go anywhere that early,” he reported, and so, was very put out.

Ms. Pattison leaves behind children, her spouse, innumerable cousins, and a grandchild. During her lifetime she was president of Gentler Rejections Oh, Please (GROP) and spent much of her time campaigning for kinder and more respectful communications between writers and editors. Often, she followed the path of least resistance, though she is said to have been adamant on the subject of wisteria. Lynn was known for half-sentences (followed by a slack-jawed pause) and for her lifelong interest in tree galls, a great variety of which she collected and mounted over the years. It is reported that Lynn has bequeathed much of her wealth to the Society of Crafters of God’s Eyes as well as to a llama ranch in Bolivia.

In earlier years, faced with financial adversity, she found herself homeless and was taken in by a kindly shepherd’s family. She learned to cook mutton in 100 ways and later wrote her much-touted poem, “Thirteen ways to shear a sheep blindfolded.”

Recently her name was bandied about.

Obituary II

Lynn Pattison never thought she was quite of this world. Tonight we report that that is now the case. Pattison, equestrian, long-distance runner, and suspected art thief, died beside a river in northern Michigan when she was overtaken by an elk stampede last Friday. She was always at her happiest when she was in the thick of things, but this was probably not the case that day. It is not known what aroused the animals, but there had been reports earlier in the day of rabid rabbits alarming various forest wildlife. Lynn loved wildlife, or more specifically, the wild life, having spent her youth as a groupie following the Monkies and later as a dare-devil skater. Lynn leaves behind her husband, a “Yooper,” and her children, with whom she claimed to be barely acquainted, and a far-reaching set of followers for her blog, Out of the Wild, an advice site for those trying to settle down a bit.

In accordance with her wishes, a (private) sky burial will be performed on a small island in the North Channel at her family’s earliest convenience. In addition to wildly showy flower arrangements, memorial contributions may be made to the community library’s fund for acquisitions of books related to hydrophobia in the lagomorphae.

Lynn Pattison

Issue 8, August 2017

lives and writes in Michigan. Her poems have appeared in The Notre Dame Review, Rattle, Rhino, Heliotrope, Harpur Palate, Primavera, The MacGuffin, and The Atlanta Review, among others. Her work has been nominated twice for a Pushcart Prize, and also appears in several anthologies, including The Cento: A Collection of Collage Poems and The Dire Elegies: 59 Poets on Endangered Species. She is the author of two chapbooks, tesla’s daughter (March St. Press) and Walking Back the Cat (Bright Hill Press), and a full-length collection of poems, Light That Sounds Like Breaking (Mayapple Press).